


Drive

by amorluzymelodia



Series: Snapshots [2]
Category: Supernatural
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-07
Packaged: 2019-06-06 21:11:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 853
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15203561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amorluzymelodia/pseuds/amorluzymelodia
Summary: Every hunter has a way of dealing with the crazy things they see and do every day.Some drink, some hook up, some exercise.Dean?Dean drives.





	Drive

Dean drives.

Every hunter has their own particular way of coping. With the fucked up shit they see on a daily basis, you need some kind of release or you’ll go insane. Well…more insane than you’ll go regardless. Because in this line of work, you’re almost guaranteed to go a little insane.

When he was younger, Dean would drink. He’d drink until he couldn’t remember his own name, let alone the name of whoever he decided to take back to the motel that night. He’d drink until he couldn’t see dead bodies whenever he closed his eyes. Until the only thing he could taste was whiskey or tequila and not the metallic taste of blood. And when his one-night-stand would ask him where he got his scars, he’d laugh it off and pretend it didn’t bother him. Make up some story about a bar fight, or falling off his bike as a kid. Sometimes they’d say they thought his scars were hot, and he’d roll off and tell them he wasn’t in the mood anymore. Then he’d drink until he passed out, wake up the next morning, and pretend like it never happened.

In truth, Dean didn’t mind his scars. They showed he’d fought tooth and nail, and that he’d won. Dean had been up against some of the biggest, baddest sons-of-bitches the world has to offer, and he’d come out the other side, trying to embody the attitude of “you should see the other guy” because the other guy wasn’t a guy at all, but a demon trapped in hell, or a Wendigo that went up in flames. And Dean? Well Dean was Dean fucking Winchester. He fought monsters, he protected people, he seduced men and women alike and he was fucking proud of that.

Or at least that’s what he would tell himself.

It’s easy to put on the bravado in the daylight. To believe the façade when you just rescued a girl, or killed a monster. They saw the tough, smart, brave man who just saved their lives. But they didn’t see what comes after. They didn’t see what Dean saw, alone in his motel room once the adrenaline wears off.

They never saw the scars underneath.

They didn’t see the scared four-year-old, clutching his baby brother to his chest and praying that the flames lapping at his heels don’t engulf them both. They don’t see the anxious teenager, desperately trying to make sure Sammy is fed, while simultaneously trying to help his dad with research on the latest hunt. They don’t see the agony of watching everyone he loves die, or going to Hell to be tortured and to torture for forty years. Or waking up in a pine box and _digging and crawling_ out of his own grave.

They don’t see all that. But Dean does. When he looks in the mirror at night he sees all the years of hardship and pain, both that he’s endured and that he’s inflicted. He feels the weight of all that’s happened pressing down on his chest like an anvil and he feels like he might explode with it all.

So. He drives.

To say the Impala was more than a car would be putting it lightly. That car was a home to both him and Sammy, and honestly the day he inherited it from John is up there with his happiest memories. Sure, he takes care of her to make John proud, but more because she’s _his_. That car has been with him through every hunt, every breakup, every fight, every single damn thing that’s happened in his life, and she’s stayed the same. Yeah, he’s built her from the ground up more than a few times, but somehow that heart of hers still remains.

The Impala is home. It’s warm and safe and closed off. When he drives it’s just him and the music and the hum of the engine and it’s dark outside but inside it’s safe. And the possibilities of where he can go are endless. He drives until he doesn’t know where he is, until he ends up at a diner, or halfway through the woods, or on a hill just to stare at the stars.

And all the shit he’s seen in the world, all the shit he’s done…somehow when he drives it all fades away. He can pretend he’s a dopey teenager in a movie, going for a joyride on the last day of school, he can roll the windows down and blast whatever music he wants, or find a spot and close off to the rest of the world, feeling safe and protected in Baby’s interior.

Hunters don’t have it easy. Dean knows this. But he also knows that for all the bad in the world, he needs to find the little semblances of good. For Dean, that’s his car. He knows there will always be another hunt, another monster, another fight. And he knows at the end of the day his carefully crafted façade will come crumbling down, leaving him feeling helpless and alone.

He knows this.

So he drives.


End file.
